Real estate deals in major cities in Bulgaria are declining—this is the data from the National Registration Agency for the first quarter of 2023. During this time, the country registered 44,461 transactions, which is 9% less than during the same period last year.

Since the beginning of last summer, there has been a downward trend in real estate transactions in cities in Bulgaria, which is associated with several factors: among them the increase in interest rates by the European Central Bank, the expectation of rising mortgage rates, the situation in Ukraine, economic uncertainty, and the strong increase in home prices in the second and third quarters.

Some numbers on the big cities where sales are falling

Sofia. During the first quarter of this year, 6381 real estate transactions were registered in the Bulgarian capital—a 13.9% decrease compared to last year for the same period (in 2022, there were 7268 sales).

Plovdiv. The number of sales in the first quarter decreased by 9% compared to last year and amounted to 3,240.

Varna. The city started the year with 2,813 transactions in the first three months. They are down as much as 23.4% from 3,471 in 2022.

Burgas. The city had 2,813 transactions in the first three months of the year, down 23.4 percent from 3,471 transactions in 2022.

The number of transactions is also decreasing in Stara Zagora (minus 24.7%), Ruse (11.6%), Blagoevgrad (9.7%), Veliko Tărnovo (19.4%), and Pleven (14.5%).

Among the exceptions to the downward trend in the first quarter were Nessebar with a 5.6% increase in transactions and Razlog with an 11.3% increase.